Food coverage is supported by a generous donation from Susan and Moses Libitzky.
Schlok’s Bagels recently opened a large shop in downtown San Francisco at 315 California St., the San Francisco Chronicle reported. The original Schlok’s, a small takeout window on Fell Street, is now a mini-me compared with the new site, where the lox is sliced by hand to order. (The bagels are still baked at the Fell Street location.) Schlok’s claims its bagels are better than ever, due to a special filtration system that ensures the best possible water to boil them in (yes, really). See below for more about Schlok’s.
We’ve long followed the success of Square Pie Guys, the Detroit-style square pizza place owned by Marc Schechter, since it first opened in S.F. in 2019. The newest shop is in Campbell at 501 East Campbell Ave., and the website promises more locations will open in Palo Alto and Walnut Creek.
Eater SF had a fun feature of what it took for Wise Sons Deli to work three days of Dead & Co. shows in Golden Gate Park the first weekend in August. The Jewish deli based in San Francisco went through 450 pounds of pastrami in three days, making 1,500 Reuben sandwiches on 200 pounds of rye bread. Plus 850 pickles.
The Oshman Family JCC in Palo Alto notified its newsletter readers recently that Tony Caters, which has run its Nourish Cafe for the past two years, will stop operating at the end of the month. We covered the controversy in 2023 when the JCC decided not to renew the leases of three kosher food vendors and subbed in Tony Caters. The JCC is planning for some temporary solutions until a more permanent one is found; we’ll continue to update you in this space.
The Bagel Blurb: The rest of my column is written by a special guest: J. CEO Jo Ellen Green Kaiser.
Hello, readers. Once a week, J.’s staff meets at our downtown office for “Bagel Thursday,” a tradition that goes back many years. Yes, we also come to get work done, but we do take our bagels (and our traditions) very seriously. That’s why we were flustered to see that the San Francisco Standard and San Francisco Chronicle had the temerity to run staff bagel tastings. We knew we had to respond with our own. Stay tuned for more tastings in the near future!
How to begin? First, we chose only San Francisco boiled-bagel shops, since our beef was with two S.F. publications. And being carb-conscious, we limited ourselves to five places. The chosen ones were:
- House of Bagels (the OG)
- Boichik
- Schlok’s
- Wise Sons
- Bones (the new kid)
We sampled only plain bagels, with no schmear, so we could compare texture and taste without distractions. All the bagels were bought fresh that morning.
We brought together eight tasters, none of them food professionals but all of them opinionated. They ranked the five bagels on a 1-5 scale, with 5 being the best.
And the winner was … well, there wasn’t just one. Frankly, all of the bagels were pretty tasty. Technically the House of Bagels won by one point, but the other contenders came close.
Here’s what we found:
- Chewiest: Wise Sons. Not quite as chewy as the late Daily Driver (which we agreed was the chewiest bagel we’d ever eaten), but it was pretty close.
- Sweetest: Boichik. Sweet, almost sugary taste to this bagel from the added malt, surprising many of us who only ever have eaten a Boichik with schmear.
- Doughiest: Schlok’s. If you want to bite into a hefty, pillowy, boiled bagel, Schlok’s is for you.
- Platonic Ideal of a Bagel: House of Bagels. It was neither too chewy nor too soft nor too sweet nor too sour. Some thought that made it boring; others thought it was the perfect bagel.
- Is it a Bagel? Bones. Everyone liked the taste and texture of these bagels, which are made with sourdough. However, two of our tasters insisted that sourdough cannot be a bagel, and that what they were tasting was actually a delicious boiled sourdough roll.
We’d love to hear which bagel is at the top of your list, and why. It can be sold anywhere in Northern California. Email us at [email protected].